Marquette University
e-Publications@Marquette
History Faculty Research and Publications
History Department
2-1-2015
[Review of] The Opium War: Drugs, Dreams and the
Making of China
Michael Wert
Marquette University, [email protected]
Published version. Choice, Vol. 52, No. 6 (February 2015): 1037-1038. Publisher link. © American
Library Association (ALA) 2015. Used with permission.
Reviews
Social & Behavioral Sciences
international diplomacy from papal Rome to Byzantium. Theodahad,
despite his Roman education and “unmanly” spirit—or perhaps because
of these—developed an inordinate avarice for land, for which Theodoric
chastised him and Procopius castigated him, as did his own emperor,
Justinian. Theodahad’s failure as a king did not last long; after killing
his cousin the queen, he was deposed for failing to defend Naples
from Belisarius and slain, while in flight to Ravenna, by the new king’s
agent. Characterized by scholarly caution, critical analysis, and heavy
annotations, this is a detailed biography of the last days of Ostrogothic
Italy and the first full treatment of its little-known king Theodahad.
Summing Up: HH Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates
through researchers/faculty.—S. Bowman, University of Cincinnati
Asia & Oceania
52-3251
BX4705
2014-5698 CIP
Brockey, Liam Matthew. The visitor: André Palmeiro and the Jesuits
in Asia. Belknap, Harvard, 2014. 515p index afp ISBN 9780674416680
cloth, $39.95
This excellent book describes the Jesuit Asian missions at a crucial
time through the eyes and reports of André Palmeiro (1569–1635), a
Portuguese Jesuit. After teaching philosophy and theology at Coimbra,
in 1617 Palmeiro was appointed visitor with wide powers to the Jesuit
missions in India, Sri Lanka, Burma, Indochina, China, and Japan.
He had to decide the extent to which Jesuits should accommodate
Catholicism to local customs. Needing income to support missions
to Indochina and China, Palmeiro created a Jesuit trading company.
He negotiated with Asian rulers and Portuguese imperial officials
and mediated disputes among strong-minded Jesuits. Palmeiro was
a judicious man who often asked, “Will it work?” But he could only
watch the brutal destruction of Catholicism in Japan. Historian Brockey
(Michigan State Univ.) offers many insights in good evocative prose.
Telling the story of the missions and disputed matters through Palmeiro
is very effective, not least because it enables readers to see how the Asian
missions functioned on a personal and practical level. The only criticisms
are the chronic use of early modern when the appropriate century
should have been named and the failure to give the original language
for translated quotes. The publisher should have provided footnotes.
Summing Up: HHH Highly recommended. All academic levels/
libraries.—P. Grendler, University of Toronto
52-3252
D767
2014-8489 CIP
Ham, Paul. Hiroshima, Nagasaki: the real story of the atomic
bombings and their aftermath. 1st U.S. ed. Thomas Dunne, 2014.
629p bibl index ISBN 9781250047113 cloth, $35.00
The focus of this comprehensive history of the US discovery and
use of atomic bombs is the bomb’s impact on the Japanese surrender in
1945 and on the subsequent Cold War. The book is well-written and has
many human-interest descriptions. The major theme is that the bomb
was unnecessary. Ham argues that with Japan’s non-functional military,
collapsed economy, and starving population, an invasion of Japan’s home
islands was unnecessary. Japanese military leadership hoped for a lenient
peace through Soviet mediation. The USSR’s declaration of war and easy
defeat of the Japanese forces undermined the morale of the Japanese leaders.
Ham makes a strong case, and the effect of the Russian attack deserves
stressing. There is no assurance, however, that surrender would have come
February 2015
before far more damage was done to Japanese cities and to US and Japanese
forces. Ham’s choice of evidence is a bit one-sided. For example, he plays
down the military uprising against the surrender. This coup came very close
to success, in spite of the fact that the second bomb had been dropped and
the Soviet attack was succeeding. Summing Up: HH Recommended. All
levels/libraries.—P. Scherer, Indiana University at South Bend
52-3253
DS383
2014-6379 CIP
Jalal, Ayesha. The struggle for Pakistan: a Muslim homeland and
global politics. Belknap, Harvard, 2014. 435p index afp ISBN
9780674052895 cloth, $35.00
Jalal (Tufts) has written before on Pakistan: her first volume was the
controversial The Sole Spokesman (CH, Jan’86) and her most recent, prior
to the present title, The Pity of Partition (CH, Jul’13, 50-6021). Now
she joins the throng of scholars and journalists who have written on
Pakistan and its turbulent history. Despite its relative insignificance in
global affairs, geopolitics, and the global economy, Pakistan has received
an enormous amount of attention. Jalal revives the old trope that the
history of Pakistan would have been very different if its founder and
governor-general, Mohammad Ali Jinnah (1876-1948), had lived longer.
In so doing she underestimates the historical forces behind the significant
challenges to the writ of the state and to Jinnah’s nation-building projects
in Bengal, and especially in the Punjab, from Pakistan’s first days. Jinnah
did not prevent—could not have prevented—this and was greeted with
protests on his visit to Dhaka in 1948. Like Jalal’s previous books, this
one is colorfully written in a blithe spirit with all the usual, predictable
comments about Pakistan’s leaders, from Jinnah to Ayub to the Bhuttos,
included. Ian Talbot presents a more reliable and judicious account of
Pakistan’s history in Pakistan: A New History (2012). Summing Up:
H Optional. Graduate students, researchers only.—R. D. Long, Eastern
Michigan University
52-3254
DS485
MARC
Llewellyn-Jones, Rosie. The last king in India: Wajid ‘Ali Shah,
1822-1887. Hurst & Company, 2014. 314p bibl index afp ISBN
9781849044080 cloth, $30.00
Llewellyn-Jones takes on a controversial if obscure personality from the
history of British India. Wajid Ali Shah was king of Awadh from 1847 to
1856. The author points out that much of the historiography on the king
focuses on this brief period and his general reputation (with the English) as
an indulgent, incompetent ruler. Historians have largely ignored his time
in exile in Calcutta as well as his poetic skill. Llewellyn-Jones attempts to
explore these lesser-known aspects of Wajid Ali’s life. The book is structured
thematically; chapter 1 begins with the unsuccessful mission of Wajid Ali’s
family members to England to regain Awadh. The other chapters deal with
his passion for theater, his wives, his menagerie, the impact of annexation,
his unbridled extravagance, frustrations with his sons, and the disintegration
of his household after his death in 1887. This very specialized book,
exhaustively researched in archives in Windsor, London, Delhi, and
Calcutta, will be primarily of interest to scholars of Indian princely
states and their rulers. Summing Up: H Optional. Graduate students,
faculty.—P. P. Barua, University of Nebraska at Kearney
52-3255
DS757
2014-23356 MARC
Lovell, Julia. The Opium War: drugs, dreams and the making of
China. Overlook, 2014. 456p bibl index ISBN 9781468308952 cloth,
$35.00
Journalist and historian of China, Lovell (Univ. of London) combines
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Reviews
Social & Behavioral Sciences
her talents in both fields to produce a narrative history of the first
Opium War between Great Britain and China. She also weaves together
general Chinese history and historical memory about the war, an event
that continues to inform Chinese national identity and affects China’s
relationship with the West. This is one of the volume’s most interesting
contributions. For example, one section shows how the first Opium War
led to the many stereotypes of China (think “Yellow Peril”) that continue
to this day. At over 350 pages of content, the constant parenthetical
details and tangents can be a bit daunting, and Lovell seems to leave no
detail unstated. However, the inclusion of copious illustrations brings
to life the tragedies of the Opium War. Although the book lies outside
specialist historiography of the war, it is nonetheless readable and a
great source for preparing lectures on the Opium War and for students
looking to add to papers on the topic. Summing Up: HHH Highly
recommended. All levels/libraries.—M. J. Wert, Marquette University
UA842
2013-36444 CIP
52-3256
Marston, Daniel. The Indian Army and the end of the Raj. Cambridge, 2014. 386p bibl index (Cambridge studies in Indian history and society, 23) ISBN 9780521899758 cloth, $95.00; ISBN
9781139898126 ebook, $76.00
Marston (military studies, Australian National Univ.) has authored
such books as The Seven Years’ War (2001), The French-Indian War 17541760 (2003), The American Revolutionary War (2011), The American
Revolution 1774-1783 (2003), and, with reference to South Asia, Phoenix
from the Ashes: The Indian Army in the Burma Campaign (2003). This
latest book offers an important assessment of the Indian Army, especially
with regard to the controversial failure to maintain peace at the time of
partition in 1947. The book covers the army during the 20th century
and is laudatory about its activities, whether fighting in the two world
wars or maintaining peace in Southeast Asia after 1945. With regard
to the charge of communalization and failure to prevent the carnage
of 1947, Marston is certain, “In the final analysis, the historical record
shows unequivocally that the vast majority of Indian Army soldiers,
NCOs, VCOs, and officers were as loyal to one another and to the
regiment as many previous generations had been, and under far more
trying circumstances.” This volume is superb and indispensable reading.
Summing Up: HHHH Essential. All levels/libraries.—R. D. Long,
Eastern Michigan University
DS559
2014-5693 CIP
52-3257
Nhã Ca. Mourning headband for Hue: an account of the battle for
Hue, Vietnam 1968, tr. and introd. by Olga Dror. Indiana, 2014. 305p
afp ISBN 9780253014177 cloth, $30.00; ISBN 9780253014320 ebook,
$29.99
Vietnam haunts not only the American conscience but also the
thousands of Vietnamese who opposed Hanoi. Mourning Headband
for Hue, the seminal work by Nhã Ca, one of South Vietnam’s leading
writers, finally has been published in English. Dror’s translation and
annotations add immeasurably to this memoir. Unfortunately, the
singular achievements of Nhã Ca have gone unrecognized except by
old Vietnam hands. During the war, she tried to be neutral, but that
proved impossible. Her position changed when she returned to Hue in
January 1968 to attend her father’s funeral, only to be rudely awakened
by the sounds of small arms and artillery fire. Despite the death and
destruction that she witnessed during the battle for Hue, Nhã Ca did not
employ typical stereotypes of Americans, South Vietnamese, or North
Vietnamese regulars and their southern allies. She managed to find some
1038
redeeming values among all combatants; however, it is apparent that she
believes her generation bears responsibility for the tragic plight that befell
Hue and all of Vietnam. This is a worthy addition to accounts that help
readers understand the Vietnam War. Summing Up: HHH Highly
recommended. Lower-division undergraduates and above; general
readers.—C. C. Lovett, Emporia State University
Central & Eastern Europe
52-3258
DK761
2014-7175 CIP
Hartley, Janet M. Siberia: a history of the people. Yale, 2014. 289p
bibl index ISBN 9780300167948 cloth, $38.00
Rather than supplant relatively recent English-language surveys
of Siberian history, Hartley (London School of Economics) aims to
supplement them with this volume. Her focus is the social history of
this vast land, in particular, “how people lived.” For the most part, she
concentrates on the Slavic peoples in Siberia rather than native peoples.
This is a useful emphasis, given that other books already focus on the
latter, and it gives the volume, which spans five centuries of history, more
coherence than it otherwise might have had. The book is organized in a
broadly chronological fashion, starting with the 16th-century conquest
and ending with a chapter on post-Soviet Siberia. Some chapters treat
topics of change over time, while others focus on the practice of daily
life in, for example, Siberian villages, towns, and garrisons. Particularly
valuable is Hartley’s employment of different levels of analysis, alternating
between discussions of the broadest themes of Russian and Siberian
history and the treatment (often archival source-based) of specific locales,
such as the remote garrison of Gizhiga on the Sea of Okhotsk. The result
is an accessible introduction to Siberian history. Summing Up: HH
Recommended. Most levels/libraries.—M. A. Soderstrom, Aurora University
52-3259
DB932
2013-46202 CIP
Vermes, Gábor. Hungarian culture and politics in the Habsburg
monarchy, 1711-1848. Central European University, 2014. 388p bibl
index ISBN 9789633860199 cloth, $65.00
Vermes (Rutgers) spent 20 years writing this book, which
appeared first in Hungarian translation in 2011. In seven chapters, he
examines the cultural and political history of Hungary from the end
of Rákóczi’s War of Independence against the Habsburgs to the eve of
the Hungarian Revolution of 1848. The author examines prominent
individuals and institutions along with the European intellectual and
cultural movements that impacted Hungary during the Baroque,
Enlightenment, and Romantic periods and the Hungarian Age of
Reform in the 1830s and 1840s. At times, Vermes draws comparisons
with neighboring states to help establish the broader European historical
context in addition to analyzing Hungary’s multiethnic character. He
pays special attention to the religious and socioeconomic fissures that
were ever present during this period and focuses his final chapters
on the flowering of Hungarian culture along with the great national
Hungarian debates surrounding the pace and direction of reforms often
opposed by the Viennese court. Vermes appropriately uses mainly
Hungarian-language sources, as well as some German and English
ones. Certain to become an important contribution to understanding
Hungarian history during the Habsburg monarchy. Summing Up:
HHH Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and
above.—C. P. Vesei, Baldwin Wallace University
CHOICE
February 2015